Join our monthly film club

KINO! Film Salon is a monthly online club to discuss films from Germany.
 
How it works: Each month we choose a German film currently available to stream on U.S. platforms, watch it independently, and come together for a hosted conversation with other fans of German cinema.

For our final meeting of 2024, we picked İlker Çatak’s multi-award winning drama The Teachers’ Lounge. Leonie Benesch plays Carla Nowak, whose relaxed rapport with her seventh-grade students is put under stress when a series of thefts occur at the school and a staff investigation leads to accusations and mistrust among outraged parents, opinionated colleagues, and angry students. The more Carla tries to mediate, the more desperate her position becomes.
From this deceptively simple premise a series of ethical, psychological, and emotional conundrums emerge, grounded in Benesch’s fearless, bravura performance. This riveting film seduces like a thriller, while offering the nuanced moral complexities of a modern fable. It’s a deeply rewarding contemporary classic that trusts its audiences with grey areas and uncertainties. The Teachers’ Lounge is a thrilling, intelligent film that deserves to be discussed and considered long after viewing.

The Teachers’ Lounge was one of the stars of the 2023 festival and awards seasons. Among other honors, it was nominated for Best International Feature Film at the Academy Awards and won Outstanding Feature Film at the 2023 German Film Awards. For her role, Leonie Benesch won the FIPRESCI award for Best Actress in an International Film at the 2024 Palm Springs International Film Festival, among others.

Hosted by Jim Kolmar

Jim programs for SXSW and Trinidad & Tobago Film Festival, and was a founding committee member of Festival Internacional de Cine Tulum (FICTU). He has participated in numerous international festival juries, panels, and committees.

KINO!Film Salon is a production of Telescope Film, in partnership with the German Film Office.

Das Lehrerzimmer
Dir. İlker Çatak
Germany, 2023
94 minutes
With Leonie Benesch, Leonard Stettnisch, Eva Löbau, Michael Klammer